November 17, 2012

SO EASY EVEN WASHINGTON CAN DO IT:

Leaders from both parties and aides to Mr. Obama said they agreed to make concessions to achieve a deal. For Democrats, that included a willingness to curb entitlement programs, such as Medicare. For Republicans that meant a willingness to raise tax revenue. The question for each side, however, is how.

White House and congressional staff will next week begin sorting through details of what a framework will look like. The leaders are expected to convene for another meeting after the Thanksgiving holiday.

Under a proposed framework, policy makers would have to agree to the amount of revenue they would raise through an overhaul of the tax code as well as the savings they would get through changing entitlement programs like Medicare. The deadline for Congress to enact these changes would be some time next year.

Republicans know tax revenues are drastically below their historic average of 18% of GDP. Democrats know you can't run an annual budget drastically higher than that. The rest is just posturing.